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The EMCC Lady Lions play host to the Lady Indians of Itawamba in a Friday doubleheader that will determine this year’s MACJC North Division softball champions. First pitch is set for 3 p.m. at the EMCC Softball Field on the Scooba campus.
Tied atop the MACJC’s North Division standings with identical 17-5 league marks, head coach Kate Neely’s EMCC Lady Lions must sweep visiting ICC in order to claim the division’s No. 1 seed for next week’s MACJC State Softball Tournament in Perkinston. Last Thursday in Fulton, the reigning division champion Lady Indians swept EMCC, 3-2 and 13-9, to take a 2-0 series lead on the year. The first tiebreaker for tournament seeding in the event of a tie between teams within the division standings is head-to-head competition.
Itawamba claimed last season’s MACJC North Division softball title by two games over runner-up EMCC en route to hosting the MACJC State Softball Tournament a year ago in Fulton. The last time East Mississippi earned at least a share of the division softball title was in 2001, when the Lady Lions shared the crown with Northeast Mississippi during the state’s first season of fastpitch softball competition within the junior college ranks.
The Lady Lions enter Friday’s regular-season finale with a 21-20 overall record after sweeping Coahoma, 11-2 and 13-2, in Clarksdale on Monday and then splitting at Mississippi Delta (8-7 loss and 17-0 win) the following day. EMCC is also slated to recognize the team’s sophomore players and managers prior to Friday’s first game against Itawamba.
Next week’s MACJC State Softball Tournament will be hosted by No. 1 South Division seed and 10th-ranked Mississippi Gulf Coast. The single-elimination tournament will begin Thursday (April 28) on the MGCCC campus and run through Saturday. The EMCC Lady Lions will be making their third straight appearance in the state tournament next week in Perkinston.